Goals

• Rooted in ALA/ZEN/SOM aesthetic but not limited to any sets

Scratch Pad
Size of the Cube
360 or 450? That is the question, I am undecided right now. Gonna whittle down to 360 and get this thing to barebones of my goals. I kinda want to just see how it all plays out. I think Ill have a different large cube that is "everything else".

The Role of Artifacts

• Smooth curve
• Have many uses to a wide variety of decks
• Incidental Artifacts can come together to make artifact decks without taking up a huge amount of slots.
• Can help fix mana but won't ramp -- I don't want it stealing too much from green's identity.
• Taking the Shard Approach so are where you'll find most of the payoffs. Maybe a few splashed into other colors?

Color Identities
Green
Green is the backbone of decks that go greedy on colors. Green is ramp. Green leans into the aggressive land strategies. I wanted a deck reminiscent of Valakut, The Molten Pinnacle and I think the Field of the Dead & Primeval Titan pair accomplishes that.

Making Baneslayer Angel Relevant
Since I am tuning the removal suite to make Baneslayer Angel good I have to be careful of how OP this makes the creatures that are better than Baneslayer (aka Gravetitan). I don't want to remove Gravetitan because it is a nostalgic and iconic card that I want to stay in the cube. How will I balance this? Will it not be balance-able and have to exist? How detrimental will that be to the environment?

When people talk about format warping cards it is often in the context of a constructed environment where consistency is king. It is generally considered a bad thing when the rest of the decks in the format all set out to beat the format-warping card. How does this translate to cube where things are more inconsistent?

My thoughts on LPR's most recent podcast on lowering mana curve: has got me thinking about this in the context of a single games and the player experience. Andy's take is that being on the receiving end of a Gravetitan or an Inferno Titan feels bad and invalidates every decision that has been made in the game up to that point. Its a "Do you have removal to answer this? No? Then I win."

Reward a player for being able to cast one of the powerful cards: Baneslayer Angel, Grave Titan, Inferno Titan, Avenger of Zendikar. With ramp being present in the cube casting these, especially before they are due could be problematic.

How do we shift casting these high mana creatures to be rewarding but not feel like the opponent has been invalidated? Or should I be fine with that because the reward is winning the game off of these high mana creatures.

Enchantment Removal
The ability to get rid of Oblivion Ring or Journey to Nowhere and give back the thing you wanted to remove from your opponent becomes a huge swing in power. Something like Portable Hole is generally going to only be affecting the early game so drawing artifact removal late wouldn't have AS big of a power swing as say getting rid of the Oblivion Ring keeping Terastodon under. Taking out enchantment removal means O-ring and Journey are unconditional removal.

Cube is a format where each pick matters. I know people use this argument for artifact and enchantment removal to always be attached to a usable body aka Kor Sanctifiers & Reclamation Sage. But some people want to encourage side-boarding in their cube. Something like Nature's Claim would go late and most likely end up in the sideboard and be boarded in in very few cases.

####Decks I remember fondly that I would like to manifest during a draft:

• Valakut
• Landfall Aggro
• Zoo
• Jund
• Artifact Aggro
• Taxes
• Humans
• Death's Shadow
• Caw-GO
• Faeries
• Mono Red Aggro
• Birthing Pod
• Blue/White Control
• Blue/Black Control
• Suicide Black
• Esper Artifact Control
• Bant Ramp Control
• Smallpox

####unlikely

• Kuldotha Rebirth
• Vampires
• Exarch/Twin
• Oath of Druids
• Black/Blue Zombies